Ben-Ari, a member of the National Union Party and reportedly a devotee of the late Meir Kahane, invited a legislative aide to photograph him ripping up a New Testament and throwing it in the garbage.

Ben-Ari then had the photos sent to Maariv. The book was mailed to Ben-Ari and the Knesset's other members by a messianic Jewish group called the Bible Society in Israel.

The Anti-Defamation League and the American Jewish Committee issued statements condemning the action. In an interview with JTA, Malcolm Hoenlein, the executive vice chairman of the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations called it an "outrageous" action that was "not acceptable."

The Jewish Federations of North America told JTA it had no comment on the incident.

The Knesset’s lone Christian parliamentarian, Hanna Sweid of the Hadash Party, told The Jerusalem Post, “This is hooliganism, bullying and an apocalyptic act of hatred that was baseless and unnecessary.”

Other Knesset members, including a spokesman for Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu, condemned the incident, and Knesset Speaker Reuven Rivlin denied Ben-Ari a chance to explain himself on the Knesset floor, saying Ben-Ari should stop giving the Knesset a bad name.

Lahav Harkov contributed to this report.

Your comment must be approved by a moderator before being published on JPost.com.
Disqus users can post comments automatically.

Comments must adhere to our Talkback policy. If you believe that a comment has breached the Talkback policy, please press the flag icon to bring it to the attention of our moderation team.